Beauty

This woman's writing is heartbreakingly beautiful.

we

I hugged a man the other day. I took him into my arms and hugged a man. I noted as I hugged him, how very physical it all was, how wide his shoulders were. Actually, quite the contrary, how wide his shoulders were not. I pulled him into me . It seemed I appraised his ribcage and what most likely resided within it. It was all rather curious. My nose was quickly at his neck. I felt his heat, his breath. A man. And yet I felt, this is only a man, not really very much. How fantastical it is that he is so small, but yet can do such large things! And here he is in my arms. I thought, I could hurt him. And I could have, but the thought only occurred in correlation with the thought, be careful, he is delicate, not to actually do the man any harm. We were startlingly made of the same stuff. I wondered how big or small I seemed to him?

***

This morning my son found me in the bathroom after my bath. He wanted to correct me. He said, "Mom, in that shooting in the States, seven were shot, not six." And he told me that a nine year old stepped in front of a five year old to take a bullet. My son is eight. He will be nine soon. I corrected him and said, "Actually, six were killed and ten more injured. I don't know about a five year old involved at all." He said, "Oh." Then he asked why. I told him it seemed someone was upset because a politician's ideas were different than his own. He said, "Really, they were killed over ideas?" and then he asked, "Where?" I said with leaden gravity, "It happened in a parking lot, son." He was very still for a very long time.

***

This evening we sat on the couch and watched Roberto Benigni in Life is Beautiful. We laughed a lot. It was getting late. Benigni is very comedic. My son liked it very much. I paused the movie though when Roberto Benigni and Nicoletta Braschi went into the greenhouse. I thought perhaps the movie was going to show them making love. This only seems ludicrous to me now while writing this, to explain a graphic shooting in a parking lot in the a.m. but to not allow my children to see two people making love in the p.m. I tucked my children into bed. I kissed them. I didn't know, but the movie was to take a turn after that, leaving most of the comedics, just as life turns for people with different ideas. In the movie all sorts of people die. Well, only Jews, but a vast variety of Jews.

***

I am tired. I go to bed. I pull my pants down. I pull my sweater off. I am surprised to see that under my clothing I am only shoulders and flesh and a ribcage. How do I explain to my son the idea of us and them? There is no us and them! There never was. There is only we.

(Via the tiny leaf)